


And If Thou Wilt, Remember

by athousandelegies



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Gen, mentions of donna noble, mentions of the Tenth Doctor - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-17
Updated: 2013-12-17
Packaged: 2018-01-05 00:11:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1087287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/athousandelegies/pseuds/athousandelegies
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A very brief fic in which the (Twelfth) Doctor pays one last visit to old friend, quiet hero, and fleeting companion, Wilf. Based on their exchange in "The End of Time" as quoted at the beginning of the fic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And If Thou Wilt, Remember

_"I’m going to die."_

_"Well, so am I, one day."_

_"Don’t you dare."_

_"All right, I’ll try not to."_

* * *

Twenty years later—well, twenty years for the white-bearded veteran from Chiswick, but much, much longer for his visitor—a man with a wide brow and wizened face sits down beside a hospital bed. The machines hooked up to the patient pulse and whirr gently; other than that, there is silence, until the battered man in the bed speaks up:

"Do I know you? I think I do…I _do_ , don’t I?"

"Oh yes. Yes, you know me."

Wilf peers through weary, watery eyes at the man sitting at his bedside, and suddenly he attempts to sit up, his ventilator groaning in protest.

" _Doctor?_ It’s you, isn’t it? Back to see me one last time, eh? That’s my Doctor." He looks over the Time Lord’s new face, the wrinkled skin, the gray hair. "Finally showing your age, I see. But it’s still _you_."

With a small smile that crinkles the corners of his eyes—old eyes, more ancient even than this new face, this elderly face, merits—the Doctor gently lowers Wilf back into the pillows.

"You didn’t think I’d let you meet this last adventure all on your own, did you?"

"Doctor, you—you told me not to—I’m sorry—I did try, you know; God knows how I’ve been _trying_ not to die—"

"And you’ve been brilliant, Wilf. Really, truly brilliant. But Wilf…you can let go."

Wilf doesn’t seem to hear. “There were times I didn’t want—when letting go would have been easier...When Sylvia passed away, when the first stroke came...but I kept going, for your sake, Doctor.” The oxygen flowing from the machine hooked up to him squeaks, struggling to keep up with this sudden gush of words. “And you know what? After everything, I’m glad I did. I’m so glad. I’ve gotten to see Donna’s kids—have you seen them? They’re beautiful, beautiful. I got to see her happy. It was worth it.”

He pauses for a long while, a smile lingering in his tired gray-blue eyes as his chest rises and falls, slowly, heavily, each breath deliberate and labored. “But now, Doctor...I wanna go.”

The Doctor meets those steady eyes and takes the wrinkled hand resting on the bedsheets in his own. “Then go, Wilf. Go on.”

Wilf sighs and closes his eyes, then opens them again, one last time. “Oh, Doctor, I don’t suppose...you could...check on Donna again? She’d love...to see you. Don’t you think you might?”

The Doctor doesn’t let his sadness show in his eyes. “That I might, Wilf. That I might.”

And the old veteran—who was proud to have gotten through many a battle without ever taking a life, who’d dreamed of stars and who’d had those dreams come true, gazing down upon the Earth from the doorway of an impossible flying blue box, who’d watched his marvelous, heroic, amnesiac granddaughter meet a man she could love and helped raise her children—closes his eyes and breaths out one last time, triumphant and at peace.


End file.
